Looking for an Auction Sniper alternative that doesn't bill per snipe and doesn't need your eBay password? Zero Hour is built for exactly that. AuctionSniper.com has been around since 1999 and pioneered the per-snipe pricing model. That model adds up alarmingly fast for active eBay buyers. Zero Hour is one flat price (or free), and your browser does the bidding.
Best for: Auction Sniper users who've watched the per-snipe charges compound, or who want to stop entering their eBay password into a third-party form.
Not ideal for: users who snipe a small handful of items per year and prefer never to commit to a subscription.
How Auction Sniper works
AuctionSniper.com is a server-side sniper, founded in 1999 and currently owned by Sniper Holdings. Like Gixen and eSnipe, you create an account on AuctionSniper, enter your eBay credentials into their settings page, and they place bids on your behalf from their servers. The first three wins are free; after that, pricing is a percentage of the winning bid: 1.95% per win, with a $0.35 minimum and a $35 maximum cap. Auctions you do not win are free.
The model has worked for 20+ years. There's a real audience for it: occasional buyers who'd rather pay 35 cents on a $20 win than commit to a subscription. But for anyone bidding regularly on mid-priced items, the percentage adds up fast.
The pricing math
Some real comparisons against Auction Sniper's 1.95%-of-win fee structure:
- Win 10 items at $20 each: $3.50 in fees (the $0.35 minimum applies). Roughly the same as Zero Hour Monthly ($2.95).
- Win 4 items at $75 each: $5.85 in fees (1.95% per win). Already more than Zero Hour Monthly.
- Win 10 items at $200 each: $39 in fees. Zero Hour Monthly is $2.95 for the same month.
- Win one $2,000 item: $35 in fees (capped). That single win costs less on Zero Hour Lifetime ($49 once) than 1.5 such wins on Auction Sniper.
- Win 50 mid-priced items over a year: commonly $50 to $200 in Auction Sniper fees. Zero Hour Lifetime is $49 once, forever.
For typical eBay buyers winning mid-priced items consistently, Zero Hour pays for itself within weeks.
The privacy distinction (same as every server-side sniper)
Auction Sniper has the same architectural trust problem as Gixen and eSnipe:
- Your eBay password lives in their database.
- Bids fire from their data centre IPs.
- The service has visibility into every item you've ever sniped.
- Their breach is your breach.
Zero Hour was designed so this requirement no longer exists. Bids fire from your machine using cookies your browser already holds. Auction Sniper would need to invert their entire architecture to match. It would no longer be a web service.
Auction Sniper logs into your eBay account from their servers. Zero Hour stays on your machine, and the architecture page explains exactly what gets sent where.
Where Auction Sniper still wins
Honest assessment:
- Computer-off sniping. Server-side fires the bid whether or not your computer is on. Zero Hour can't.
- Pay-only-when-you-win pricing. Three free wins, then 1.95% of the win price, capped at $35. Genuinely cheap if you only buy one or two low-ticket items a year.
- Bulk and group snipes. Auction Sniper has mature "snipe groups." Zero Hour ships this in v2.
- Two decades of reliability data.
Feature comparison: head to head
The honest summary table is in the privacy comparison below. The headline differences:
- Auction Sniper requires your eBay password; Zero Hour never asks.
- Auction Sniper bills 1.95% of each win (capped); Zero Hour bills flat monthly or lifetime, regardless of how much you win.
- Auction Sniper is a website; Zero Hour is a Chrome extension.
- Auction Sniper is closed-source; Zero Hour ships unminified.
Migration in 4 minutes
- Install Zero Hour from the Chrome Web Store.
- In Auction Sniper, cancel any pending snipes you'd like to move.
- Paste each eBay URL into Zero Hour's Add Snipe sheet, set max bid, save.
- If you'd like to permanently remove your eBay credentials from Auction Sniper's database, log into account settings and delete your account. Or simply change your eBay password. Their stored copy will stop working.